


In the Depths of Winter, A Fairytale

by LyricaXXX (LyricaB)



Category: Lewis (TV)
Genre: Lewis Challenge Christmas/Winter Challenge 2018, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-15
Updated: 2019-01-15
Packaged: 2019-10-10 15:41:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17428763
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LyricaB/pseuds/LyricaXXX
Summary: James sighs and stuffs his cigarettes back into his pocket. It’s been a long and tiring day, and intervening in what sounds like an argument between an angry, drunk couple isn’t the way to end it. Spending what's left of the evening in a warm, crowded pub, with Robbie forced to sit close, drinking a couple of pints, listening to Christmas carols on a tinny speaker…that’s what James had in mind. And then maybe being a little too pissed to drive so that Robbie insists he spend the night on the too-short-for-comfort couch. That's an even better plan.





	In the Depths of Winter, A Fairytale

**Author's Note:**

>   
> _Insert the usual yadda, yadda about running late and not being inspired, not so much due to contrary muses this time, but because of too much real life and way, way not enough sleep. And not enough time for a beta, so please forgive my mistakes._  
>   
>   
>  _This was written for the[Lewis Challenge Christmas/Winter Challenge 2018](https://lewis-challenge.dreamwidth.org/). Huge, overflowing baskets of thanks and pitchers of margaritas to our Admin Goddesses for continuing to run challenges for us, and for their understanding and patience with my constant tardiness._  
>   
>   
>  _My prompts were:_  
>   
>                      • From Santa’s Sack… A song:   
>   
>                                                             “Fairytale of New York”  
>                                                                                     _The Pogues_  
>   
>   
>                      • From the Winter Chest… A quote:  
>   
>                                                            In the depth of winter, I finally learned  
>                                                            that there was in me an invincible summer.  
>                                                                                     ~ L'Eté, _Albert Camus_  
>   
>   
>  _And now I can't get "Fairytale of New York" out of my head. {sigh}_

  
  


* * *

  
  
  


> I've got a feeling  
>  This year's for me and you.  
>  So, Happy Christmas.  
>  I love you, baby.  
>  I can see a better time  
>  When all our dreams come true.  
>                     ~Fairytale of New York, _The Pogues_

 

> Au milieu de l'hiver, j'apprenais enfin  
>  qu'il y avait en moi un été invincible’.  
>                     ~ L'Eté, _Albert Camus_

 

James can hear the commotion as he opens the door onto the street. Even the chatter and laughter of the group of young women trying to enter the pub as he tries to slip out don’t drown out the growing furore of angry voices—a man’s, yelling, and a woman’s, shrill with fury. He can’t hear the words, just the drunken, angry tones. Slurred consonants. Unintelligible vowels.

He sighs and stuffs his cigarettes back into his pocket. It’s been a long and tiring day, and intervening in what sounds like an argument between an angry, drunk couple isn’t the way to end it. Spending what's left of the evening in a warm, crowded pub, with Robbie forced to sit close, drinking a couple of pints, listening to Christmas carols on a tinny speaker…that’s what James had in mind. And then maybe being a little too pissed to drive so that Robbie insists he spend the night on the too-short-for-comfort couch. That's an even better plan. Waking on Christmas Eve morning with a slightly thick head and kinks in his back to the smell of brewing coffee and Robbie making bacon and eggs. That’s what he had in mind. But he and Robbie haven’t even had time to order their pints. 

And the voices are growing louder and more strident. 

As he reaches high on the edge of the door to hold it open for the gaggle of students, he glances back into the pub. Robbie is several feet away, in line at the bar, caught in the leading edge of young women. One of them is looking up at Robbie flirtatiously, admiration clear in her smile. And Robbie’s smiling down at her. 

James can clearly read the mixed pleasure and disbelief in his expression. A dart of annoyance zips through him that Robbie never sees that same look of admiration on James’s own face. That Robbie never smiles back at him with such pleasure. 

It’s with a bit more relish than he should feel when he calls, “Sir!” and motions for Robbie to join him. The ‘sir’ should be shorthand enough to communicate to Robbie that it’s work and timely. And sarcasm enough to say that he’s seen Robbie flirting with a slip of a female who’s probably a third of his age. Not that Robbie will care what James thinks about him flirting. 

Cold, crisp night air slithers inside James’s collar as he steps away from the door of the pub. The sharp, clean scent of winter burns his lungs, wipes out the smells of beer and cologne and burning logs. The door swings closed on the din from inside. But even with that noise closed off, the angry sounds seem further away than he knows they must be. The thick snow on the ground and the gently wafting snowflakes still falling make everything seem muffled. 

He glances left, then right, blinking, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the darkness as snowflakes land on his nose and his forehead. 

The pub door swings open and Robbie is suddenly right on his heels. James doesn’t have to explain what’s drawn him outside. Robbie hears it immediately. He glances left, then right, too. 

“There,” James says, pointing. A block and a half down the street, just inside the deep shadow of an alleyway, James can just barely see movement. Frenetic waving shadows evoking the gesticulating arms of someone embroiled in an argument. 

James starts in that direction, and Robbie moves with him, stepping off on the same foot as if they’re marching. James moves too quickly and slips on the ice that’s hidden beneath a layer of snow on the pavement. Robbie catches him, gripping James’s shoulder to steady him, murmuring, “Careful,” without ever stopping his forward movement. “Don’t want to have to stop off at A&E on the way to book this lot.” 

James huffs with annoyance, both at his own clumsiness and at the idea of having to arrest a gaggle of fighting drunks at the start of his long-promised holiday. He and Robbie and Lizzie are supposed to be off duty until the day after Boxing Day. Lizzie’s already off to London with friends, and Robbie’s due in Manchester by Christmas morning to visit Lyn and Jack. James’s only plans are catching up on some of his reading and lost sleep. He’s not eager to add a sprained ankle. Or worse. 

As they draw nearer, James is surprised to see that for all the ruckus, there’s only a man and a woman squared off, arguing. It was the shadows of the woman’s animated, waving arms that he saw. The man, dressed in worn jeans and an expensive looking leather jacket, is obviously more pissed than she is, but just as angry. His movements seem to be mostly limited to weaving and wobbling. And glaring. He’s quite as tall as Robbie, but he looks as if he has more muscle than James and Robbie combined. 

“If we have to tackle them,” James says low and out of the side of his mouth, “I’ll take her. You take him.” 

Robbie grins, a quick upturn of lips that he bites his upper lip to hide. “Thanks. But I think you may have gotten the bad end of that stick. She’ll kick your arse.” 

James looks at the woman again. She looks the way she sounds, tall and thin and shrilly furious. She’s wearing thigh-high leather boots and an improbably short, shiny, tight mini-dress. Her long blonde hair curls down over the shoulders of a coat almost as long as the dress. It looks like it’s made from woolly mammoth fur. “You might be right,” he concedes. “Let’s swap.” 

As if to prove Robbie’s point, the woman curses and shoves the man so hard he slips and has to manage a falling, stumbling, clumsy bounce on the balls of his feet to keep from falling. When he regains his balance, he shoves her back. She swings at him and her hand connects with a slap that overrides the muffling effect of the snow. Her hand on his face sounds like a shot. He swears and grabs for her, one fist rises as the other twists the collar of her coat to hold her in place. She slaps him again, but she’s so close that the blow lands ineffectively on the thick leather of his sleeve. 

Robbie yells, “Oi!” and steps out ahead of James, moving so quickly and nimbly on the icy pavement that James has to trot, slipping and sliding, to catch up with him. 

The two combatants freeze comically in mid-tussle and turn slowly to face them. The woman’s face twists with anger as the man lowers his fists. “What’re you lookin’ at?” he demands. 

Robbie flips his warrant card out of his breast pocket. “A brawl in the middle of the street to me,” he says mildly. “What’s going on here?” 

The man’s face twitches as he strives for calm and sober innocence, but the woman’s expression doesn’t change. “We’re having a private disagreement,” she bites out. There’s a warning of fury about to change its focus and a bit of a slur to her words, but she’s not as drunk as James assumed she would be from the sound of the argument. 

“Not so private since we could hear it over a block away,” Robbie says, pointing back in the direction of the pub. His voice is still mild and calm. “And it looked like you were about to punch her.” 

“Awww…she hit me first,” the man complains. “But I wasn’t gonna hit her. Just tryin’ to scare her a bit.” His voice sounds perhaps a bit more inebriated than hers, but as with the woman, still not as bad as James expected. “And shut her up.” 

The woman pokes him in the ribs. “Never happen, love.” Then she turns to Robbie and declares in a tone all claws and steel, “He would never hit me. He wouldn’t dare.” 

And the man, who’s almost twice as wide as her and could clearly knock her out with one blow, nods sheepishly and pokes her back. “Nope. Never.” 

She softens and smiles at him fondly and reaches out to caress the red handprint on his cheek. “Sorry I hit you, baby. I was just trying to hit your arm, but you stumbled.” 

The man shrugs as if it’s no big thing and holds her hand to his face. 

Robbie sighs. “All right, then. Off with the pair of you. Get yourselves inside,” he gestures towards a nearby café, “have some coffee and take a taxi home. I’m going to have a car drive by in a while, and the officer on duty better not hear any more shouting or commotion.” 

The man nods and mimes a salute at Robbie, and the couple walks away in the direction Robbie has pointed. 

James says, “Thought you wanted to run them in.” 

“For what? She’s never going to press charges.” 

James snorts. “She’s not the one who’s been assaulted.” 

Robbie laughs, shaking his head as he watches the two amble away, still arguing good-naturedly. 

“Gonna scare me, huh?” The woman purrs as she laughs up at the man. “You’re a punk!” 

“Well, you’re a slut!” he rejoins equitably. 

“Bastard!” she says, just as agreeable. 

“Bitch,” he responds without rancor. 

She says something else, but the word is lost as they step off the kerb and start across the street. It must have been a good insult, though, because the man laughs and throws an arm around her shoulders and kisses the side of her head. She slaps him on the arse as he holds the door of the café open for her. 

James huffs disbelief and annoyance. Wearing boots and half-pissed, they both just walked more easily on the ice and slush on the asphalt he did on the pavement. “It’s just like the video for Fairytale of New York, right down to the names they were calling each other.” 

Robbie echoes the sound, though it has more amusement than annoyance in it. “Yeah. Never quite understood the appeal of that song. Not the happiest of Christmas sentiment.” 

James smiles. “I think that _is_ the appeal. The lyrics make the story bittersweet and real. And hopeful. The couple’s not happy _now_ , but there’s hope for better times to come.” 

Robbie turns back towards the pub. He shuffles carefully across the pavement where there’s an obvious patch of ice, moving to the side so that the walls of the shops are within easy reach. “Yeah, because lyrics like “Happy Christmas your arse, I pray God it's our last” are so optimistic and hopeful.” 

James laughs and moves so that he’s walking behind Robbie, hugging the wall, too. “Did you and Laura ever row like that?” The moment he says it, he wishes he could breathe the words back in, a cold rewind of air sucking back into his lungs. It’s insensitive, at best. Robbie hasn’t talked much about why he and Laura went their separate ways after New Zealand, and though James is curious, he’s tried to respect Robbie’s privacy. And Laura’s, too, because he’s talked to her several times since Robbie returned, and she hasn’t mentioned the end of their relationship either.

Robbie slows and glances at him quizzically, then continues on. “No,” he says finally, “not even at the end. Not that we didn’t ever disagree or argue—” 

James makes a rude sound. He doesn’t need to be told that. He’s been the mediator a few times, most often talking to Robbie, but once or twice to Laura, and once to both. 

Robbie ignores him. “But it was all very….civilized. Even when she was furious with me. Val on the other hand… She could hold her own in a row.”

James stops. His soles slide and his arm pinwheels before his grip on the wall steadies him. The weather of the past few days has been oddly warm for December, warm enough to melt the ice that’s exposed to sunlight, but cold enough that shadowed and covered areas are still treacherous. 

Robbie reaches out to touch the wall with one hand and back with the other to steady James. 

“You and Val fought? Like that?” He points backwards. 

Robbie wobbles, too, as he turns and protests with some heat, “’Course not. I’ve never been drunk enough to raise my hand to a woman in me life!” 

Then he turns back and slip/slides his way to safe footing. He holds out his hand for James. “Come on. Let’s get back inside before one of us falls on his arse.” 

James walks carefully to him. “I know you’d never do that,” he points towards the mouth of the alleyway again, “drunk or sober. I wasn’t talking about fighting like _that_. I mean just…arguing. Rowing.” 

Robbie smiles with a sweet, melancholy expression. “Yeah. We rowed. A few screaming matches when we were younger. But not many. We mostly got along.”

James is accustomed to Robbie’s reactions to memories of Val, but it seems odd that he would remember fighting with his wife fondly. Though, James supposes that losing someone so unexpectedly can make even the less-than-happy memories precious. 

They start back up the street, angling back out to the edge of the kerb where there’s more snow and less ice. Moving carefully from streetlamp to streetlamp. 

“Especially after the kids came along,” Robbie continues, “we kept our disagreements low key. No matter how mad you get, you can’t go scaring the kids. And even after Lyn and Mark were of an age… Well, we never really went back to the yelling and slamming doors like when we were young. Val’d go for days without speaking to me when she was put out, usually because I’d been out drinking with Morse, or when I’d missed some important event because of a case. She didn’t yell, but I’ve spent me share of nights on the couch. Or in the guest room, once we had one. Sure was glad of that. Sleeping on that couch was a misery.” 

Robbie arches his back as if he still feels the twinges, then glances sideways at James. “Why’re you so interested in me fights with me wife?”

James blushes and shrugs. “I don’t know… I guess… I can’t remember my parents rowing, but then, my mum was gone when I was so young… I guess I’ve never been around that kind of thing. Except on the job, and then it’s always the worst of the worst, right? Not like… well, not like how it was for you and Laura. Or you and Val.”

“Seem to remember you and Fiona McKendrick having a couple of disagreements.” 

James shrugs. “Yeah, I guess. But that was, like you said, very civilized. It was almost like we were going through the motions. Doing what was expected, you know? She was moving on. She wasn’t willing to stay, and she knew I wasn’t interested in making the changes it would take to go, so we had to play the wounded— I don’t even know what word to use. It wasn’t like we were ever committed enough to call each other partners. Or lovers.”

Robbie pauses, hand on handle, as they reach the door of the pub they just left. He shakes his head and smiles. “Sometimes, lad, you think too much.” 

With a wry, self-conscious laugh, James shrugs and nods his agreement. 

Robbie jerks his head towards the pub. Even with the door closed, the sound of dozens of people—talking, laughing, clinking glasses—is a low roar. The faint scent of too many bodies pressed too close, and a crackling fire, and spilled beer seeps out. “You want to go back in? We could go back to mine and have a real night before Christmas Eve drink.” Robbie arches his eyebrows. “Or two. Or three.”

James nods. “Sounds good.” He’d much rather sit on Robbie’s couch and drink as much as he wants and not have to worry about getting home, than go back into the crowded pub and not be able to hear half of what Robbie’s saying over the voices and the barely recognizable piano solo from some Christmas song. 

They walk on in silence, footsteps loud on the snow. In some of the shop windows, holiday lights blink and glitter, tinsel gleams, and brightly-coloured, decorative packages tied with huge ribbons beckon. Even with the light pollution from shops and the pinkish light from streetlamps, stars blink and sparkle in the night sky, rivalling the decorations. 

James thrusts his hands into his coat pockets. The night is bitterly cold, but so beautiful with the softly falling snow and the reflection of lights and stars glistening off it, that he’s willing to bear stiff fingers and aching toes and the shivery cold of snowflakes melting on his ear tips. Especially since he’s sharing it with Robbie. 

Robbie slows to a stop at the corner of the street and peers up at falling snow. He says softly, “About the rowing… No point in getting all worked up if you don’t really care, is there?” 

“So you and Laura didn’t really—” The words are out of James’s mouth before he can stop them. His stomach cringes inside his abdomen at the tactlessness of the thought spoken aloud. 

But Robbie doesn’t take offence. “You’re thinking too much again, lad,” he chides, then he thumps James on the side of the head gently. “And it’s none o’ your business!” 

James nods in agreement and hopes his apology shows in his expression. “Yeah. Sorry.” 

Robbie doesn’t look at James as he says, “It wasn’t that we didn’t care.” His voice is as soft as the falling snow, but thick with emotion. “I’ll always have a soft spot in me heart for Laura. It was just that— I guess it was just—” He takes a breath and blows out frosty air. “It was just that, in the long run, what we each wanted was so different that even rowing about it wouldn’t have made a difference.” 

“You wanted to come back to Oxford, and she wanted to stay in New Zealand?” James guesses. 

“Something like that.” Robbie looks at him strangely, but when he sees that James has noticed, he turns away and carefully walks on, across the pavement, moving over to the low stone wall that cuts a curving line up the slope. His feet crunch into the ice-crusted grass. 

But James is so suddenly, sharply, struck with a memory that he doesn’t dare move. He stares down into the gutter, allowing his gaze to slip out of focus. He’s almost never allowed himself to remember the image of Robbie’s face that his mind superimposes over the dark slush and ice beyond his toes. 

He’s stuffed it far down into his brain, that image and the fear he’d felt that day. Wrapped it all in layers of cottony white as if he was packing away a fragile snow globe that might break, scattering bits of fake snow and drops of water everywhere, if it was shaken. But the memory hasn’t grown dim with time, no matter how deeply he’s buried it. 

_His DI is angry with him. Spitting his words like poison-tipped darts. Piercing James with anger, with anguish so vivid and vehement it’s sharp as a knife. ‘You lied to me! Forget Will, forget the case. You lied to me! To me!’ His voice vibrates with pain and fury, with a guttural tone that’s like scraping raw flesh over rusted, corrugated metal. He’s deaf to James’s pleas for understanding, for forgiveness. Making slashing movements with his hands as if he can cut James from his life, erase James from his sight. ‘No! Just go away. I don’t want to see ya!’_

James remembers standing alone in the alley, sounds ebbing and flowing. Music and laughter and life. People talking, cheering, running, dancing. And then all the sounds are gone. All the colours are gone. The scents of flowers and suntan lotion. Coffee and beer, gone. Snuffed out. 

All he can see is brown, dull and lifeless. An afterimage burned onto his retinas…the brown Robbie’s jacket, the expanse of his back, disappearing. All James can hear is the angry slap of leather on asphalt. 

How horrified he’d been, that first time, at the sound of his DI walking away from him. How sure he’d been that he wouldn’t be forgiven. That he’d jeopardized his job. That he’d damaged the most important relationship of his career. And worse, ruined the precariously new, growing friendship that was beginning to loom more large in his thoughts than it should. 

But each of the times afterward that he and Robbie had argued—over a case or some bumble-headed mistake James had made, or even some mistake that Robbie had made—that feeling of iron bands strapped too tightly across his chest and colours sapped of life had eased as he began to understand that Robbie would always forgive him. Even risk his life to save him, despite his anger and disappointment. 

Though…in fairness, their disagreements hadn’t all been like that. Robbie is one of the fairest men James has ever known. And for all the disagreements, there’d been just as many times that Robbie snapped at him, then realized what he was doing, and backed down, saying, ‘Tell me what I’m missing’, or ‘Tell me what you see’, or James’s personal favourite, ‘All right then, clever clogs. Explain it to me’. 

But that first time, that first argument, Robbie standing in that alley, anger and pain leaking from every pore, ordering James to go away… That had looked more like that drunken couple than any argument James ever had with family or someone he was dating. 

He looks up and sees that Robbie is halfway up the slope to the car. He’s stopped, fingertips resting lightly on the low stone wall head tilted in question, waiting. 

James hurries to catch up, heart racing. His feet slip on the pavement, footsteps mirroring the uneven beat of his pulse, and he has to stop to steady himself. He looks up at Robbie, but like the couple, Robbie’s just on the edge of the bluish circle of light cast by the closest streetlamp. James can tell that Robbie’s staring at him, but he can’t see Robbie’s face. 

And he stops again. Catches his balance. Has he missed it, all these years? Had he wanted so desperately that he’d missed the signs of the very thing for which he’d wished? 

“What’s up?” Robbie asks as James comes abreast of him. 

James looks sideways, pretending to search for a handhold on the icy wall, dipping his head so Robbie’s face is blurred through his lashes. And he says carefully, with just a touch of hope, just a touch of care, in case he’s got the wrong end of the stick. Again. “I was just thinking… We’ve had a few rows through the years. And some of them looked more like that couple back there, minus the drunken stumbling, than any argument I’ve ever had.” 

Robbie smiles, his expression soft, as if these memories, too, are good ones. “Aye.” 

Still hesitant, James says carefully, “I guess that’s…because…we care. You…care?” It’s mostly question, with just a bit of bravado thrown in. 

Robbie nods, just the barest movement, head sitting stiff atop his neck as if he’s afraid, too. 

The heat that blossoms in James’s chest is hot enough to melt the ice and snow around him. The elation that flairs would surely shine out of his eyes and light up the night sky if he could just bring himself to look up. 

Robbie tilts his head just a bit and says something. But it’s so low that James can’t decipher it. He can only hear the soft rumble of Robbie’s voice, see the faint frost of words in the cold air. 

“What?” he whispers. “I didn’t—I couldn’t hear you.” He almost doesn’t want Robbie to answer, because as long as they stand there, silent, breathing each other’s breath, he can pretend that Robbie’s agreed with him. That he’s breathed Robbie’s _‘yes’_ into his lungs. That Robbie hasn’t said something logical, like _‘Well, of course, I care about you, man. We’re partners, aren’t we? Friends.’_

Robbie catches James’s chin and lifts it. His fingers are cold, his touch gentle. And his eyes, as James meets his gaze, surpasses all the glow and glitter of the lights in the windows behind them. “Daft sod,” he says affectionately. “Took you long enough.” 

James can barely breathe, but he manages enough oxygen to rasp, “Took me long enough to do what?” 

“To figure out I didn’t come back to Oxford. I came back to you.” Robbie closes the distance between them and kisses him. 

It’s a gentle kiss, just cold lips against his cold lips, barely moving. And James doesn’t dare return the caress for fear that he’s dreaming it. That if he moves his lips, he’ll suddenly come to awareness, standing on the cold street with Robbie staring at him in disbelief as he makes kissing motions with his mouth. 

Robbie pulls back from him. “James?” His voice has a tinge of concern in it. “I’m sorry if I misunderstood…” 

And with a rush of joy that’s electric, the reality of it washes over James. He wasn’t dreaming. Nothing imaginary could taste so sweet as Robbie’s cold kiss. And James shakes his head emphatically and leans in again, tilting so that his mouth is at just the right level for another kiss. His words whisper visibly over Robbie’s cold-reddened face. “No, you didn’t misunderstand. You got it just right.” 

Robbie smiles, and the sweet intimacy of it is better than any richly wrapped present under a tree groaning with ornaments and gleaming bright lights. He kisses James again, cold hands coming up to frame James’s face. 

James laughs into the kiss, tasting a sweetness as familiar as homemade ice cream. The warm, familiar scent of Robbie overwhelms the clear, crisp scent of cold. A shiver runs over James as if someone has just dropped a handful of snow down the back of his shirt, then followed it with a handful of scorching coals. Sweat breaks out on his spine, in his armpits, in the centre of his chest. 

They could be standing in the centre of an asphalt car park, in the worst heat of summer, instead of in snow with the bells of Oxford ringing out midnight. It’s Christmas Eve, and no searing sun could make his face burn hotter or his heart beat faster. 

Robbie pulls back to breathe, and his hands slide up, fingertips covering the tips of James’s ears.

James shivers again. 

“You’re freezing,” Robbie murmurs. 

But James shakes his head, hands coming up to cover Robbie’s hands. His palms feel as if they’re glowing, as if the coldness of Robbie’s knuckles will leave marks branded into his Robbie-scorched flesh. “I’m burning up.” He tilts his head back, half expecting little whirls of steam to rise up where the snow touches his burning face. Instead, tiny pearls of melted snow glide across his eyelids and gather on his lashes. “I’m melting like snowflakes in the middle of summer.” 

Robbie grins and wrinkles his brow. “And now you’re gonna go all Cambridge on me.” His hands slide down to rest on James’s neck, fingers slipping inside the collar of his coat. What’s that quote? In the depths of winter…”

James isn’t sure whether it’s his own pulse he can feel, thudding against Robbie’s fingertips, or Robbie pulse beating against his neck. 

“Well?” Robbie says playfully. “Don’t tell me you don’t know it. I’ll never recover from the shock.” 

James’s brain feels viscous and enflamed, like that poor frog in the pot of water, only just beginning to realize he’s being boiled alive. It takes him a moment to order his thoughts, to pull up the reference. Camus, he thinks. _Albert Camus._ “In the midst of winter…” 

Robbie interrupts,. “In the _depths_ of winter…” 

“Actually…” James’s thoughts spiral away again as Robbie’s thumb slips across his jaw and traces the line of his lips. 

Robbie grins at him, eyes glittering with mirth. 

“You’re doing that on purpose!” James catches Robbie’s thumb to still it. “Distracting me.” 

Robbie shrugs. “Testing you. It’s not often I have you at a loss for words. Especially when it’s over toff poetry or some such.” 

“Oi! I’m not a toff.” James would pull back in pretend indignation, but it would mean that he’d have to move away from the searing cold of Robbie’s fingers. 

“’Course not.” Robbie drops his hands down to James’s waist. “But what’s the quote?” 

James knows it’s impossible that he can feel the temperature of Robbie’s fingers through layers of shirt, jacket, and quilted coat. But still…he imagines the warmth seeping through. The coolness. He shivers and forces himself to speak clearly and not as if he’s poured bubbling champagne straight into his brain. “There’s disagreement about the exact wording. It’s mostly quoted as the ‘depth’ of winter, but if you go back to the original French, the word used is ‘milieu’ which can be ‘middle’ or ‘midst’. ” 

“But what’s the quote?” Robbie persists. He uses his grip on James’s coat to turn him towards the car. “Let’s get on while you think. You may be blazing away, but I’m freezing.” 

As they move off together, shoes loud on the frozen grass, James intones, “In the depth of winter, I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer.” 

Robbie’s grin grows wider. “Clever clogs,” he says affectionately. 

James recognizes what Robbie’s doing immediately, but he can’t think of a single thing to call Robbie in return. He wouldn’t begin to use any of the words from the song, not even in gest, or that the arguing couple used. So he slings his arm around Robbie’s shoulders the way the man did as he and his partner walked away. 

But then James remembers something. Something Robbie said to him many years ago. And he kisses the side of Robbie’s head and says clearly and with as much of a sneer as he can muster, “Sir.” 

Robbie slips his arm around James’s waist, and snowflakes whirl and eddy from the gusts of Robbie’s laughter.  
  
###  
  



End file.
